Ignite
by phonetic phoenix
Summary: He makes the world sound so hurtful, so sad, that her heart breaks. With him, she's tempted to let it all go up in flames. {multichaptered; intentionally written for Liper December; rated T for language}
1. I

**Summary:** _He makes the world sound so hurtful, so sad, that her heart breaks. With him, she's tempted to let it all go up in flames._

**Warnings:**_ minor adult content (If there was such a thing as a T+ then that would be the rating)._

**A/N:**_ HAPPY NEW YEAR MY SWEETS! This story was intentionally written for Liper December, but my struggle with procrastination is all too real.  
_

_Dedicated to ask-liper as a(n) [oh-so-late] Christmas present (happy schistmas)._

_This story shalt be around three chapters long (maybe shorter idk anymore)._

**Disclaimer:**_ I don't own PJO. *sobs violently* *cries under mistletoe*_

_AU AU AU AU AU AU AU AU AU AU AU AU AU_

* * *

**_..._**

**_Ignite_**

**I**

**_..._**

* * *

In Piper's world, bars are for thinking, and not drinking.

They're like her little sanctuaries; she takes a chair in the far corner, far from advances and flirts, and just...thinks. Reminisces. Wonders what could have gone so horribly wrong in the past few months to have her invest her comfort in such a place as a bar.

Instead of taking shot after shot, she gets drunk in her own way - drowning her sorrows in texts to Annabeth or Hazel or some other friend who has nothing to do on a Saturday night. Everyday is a bad day for her, and in the particularly bad ones, she drags the physical forms of her before-mentioned friends away from their everyday lives and into the seats next to her. If she can't be happy on particularly bad days, no one can.

Today had not been particularly bad, thank goodness. The only things that had happened today that were worth mentioning were that her agent had gotten her a deal for a minor role in a soap opera, and that her snippy publicist had quit, which was good. It wouldn't be that hard to find another one, considering who her father was. She'd have someone to replace the former in two days tops.

Today, Piper had taken her seat in the shadows once again. Stirring the straw in her drink of water and tracing the rim of her glass with a finger, she sullenly gazed at the burly alcoholics across the room. Some game was going on between some teams she did not care about, and she was right about to pry her phone out of her back pocket when the bell over the bar door 'dinged', and someone walked in.

Short guy. Latino. Curly hair and elfish ears. Piper brusquely upturned her nose and took a sip of her water. He wasn't a regular; probably just another junkie looking to get wasted. Nothing about the newcomer really stood out to her...maybe except for the fact that he was heading straight towards her and her sanctuary.

Piper felt exceedingly uncomfortable and self-conscious as the guy sat on the stool next to her and leaned over the counter, picking up the menu and skimming over its contents. She tried _so hard _not to stare, so extremely hard to look at anything but the perpetrator who had managed to infiltrate her corner. Piper realized that she had failed when he suddenly tossed the menu back down on the counter and spun around to look at her.

His eyes met hers, and she could only stammer. "Um - "

His eyes were brown, a deep shade of the color. She almost didn't catch it, but there was a glint in one of his eyes that looked more macabre than friendly.

"Sorry to bother you," he cut her off, and he did sound genuinely sorry. "But...I need to get somewhere, and my car's curbed two blocks back. Can you help me?"

His voice had pulled Piper out of her last thought and into the next. He tapped his fingers on the counter, and she blinked at him. The request had taken her so aback that the glass of water slid out of her hands and fortunately back onto the table, a small amount of water spilling over the rim.

"Um...excuse me?"

"A ride," he repeats, and rests one of his elbows on the counter. "My car broke down two blocks down, and I left all of my tools at home. I just have to get home, bring the tools back here, and fix 'er up. I figured I should ask you for a ride since, you know, you seem to be the only sober person in here. Can you help me?"

She raised a skeptical and incredulous eyebrow at him. "You want a ride from _me? _How do you know I'm not a serial killer? I could turn around and chop you up," she pauses to raise the glass to her lips, and bites the rim in a smile. "...you wouldn't even see it coming."

He returned the gesture, arching an eyebrow into his curly crown of hair. "Well, for one thing, most serial killers don't voice their plans. Also, they're usually not that pretty."

"Oh har, har," she shoots back at him after grabbing her water again. "What a spectacular specimen of idiot you are. What's your name?"

"Leo. And yours, _belleza?"_

Meh. She figured it wouldn't hurt. "Piper McLean."

His eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Of the moneybag McLeans?"

Piper shrugged and took a sip of her water. "Sure, you could say that."

Leo took a good while to stare at her in awe before he remembered why he was there in the first place. "So, Ms. McLean. You going to help me or not?"

She let out a dramatic sigh that her coach would've been oh-so-proud of. "Fine." Her hand slid down from the counter and into her pant pocket, and she pulled out the keys to her car. Without hesitation [and not in her right mind], she tossed the keys to him. "Here. It's the Porsche out back. Just don't crash it and bring it back, kay?"

It's _his_ turn to be taken aback. His eyes darted back and forth between the keys in his hand and her face. "You...you just gave me the keys to your car."

She gives a slight nod as she takes a sip from her glass, delved back into her own problems. "Yep. Now go before I change my mind."

"But- "

_"Leave." _ The surprisingly-not-a-junkie leaves in such a hurry, it's almost comical.

To be honest, Piper just wanted this evening to herself. She didn't care if he got a scratch on it, really (her dad would cover that. The car practically paid for itself). All she wanted was a few moments to herself, to wallow in her pathetic existence and be alone with no one but her thoughts.

It's roughly forty-five minutes later, she's falling asleep and seriously considering to walk home when Leo comes in through the bar doors with a rather ceremonious 'ding', the keys to her car visibly in hand. When Piper sees him, she sits up, slightly and honestly surprised that he actually returned.

She allows him to enter her niche once again, and he hands her the keys with a smile. "Thanks, really. I got the tools from my place and fixed the car, and headed this way as soon as I was done. I fixed your engine too, 'cause it was making this weird sound that I felt needed to be checked out."

Piper yawned before raising her eyebrows. "Wow, thanks. That thing's been bothering me for weeks."

What's done is done. Piper expected Leo to up and leave the place and head back home, but when he sat back in the chair, it dawned on her that tonight was going to be a little bit longer than expected.

Leo leans an elbow on the counter, like before. "So...you regularly hand your car keys to strangers?"

"No," she replies with a small smile, and she stirs her straw in her drink for the second time that night. "Not really."

"Then why the sudden change of heart?"

"I just felt like it, I guess."

Leo gave her a disbelieving look. "You just felt like giving a stranger the keys to your seventy-five thousand dollar Porsche."

Piper snorted, and shoved him with her free hand. "Of course not. We're not strangers now, are we? And it's eight hundred and forty-five thousand, not seventy-five."

He gives her a look that's so incredulous that all she can do is laugh. If anything, it makes her seem more enticing.

The moment dissipated into the next. When she was done laughing, she took a few sips from her water to break the tension, and a question came to mind.

"Leo?" she asked after a while.

His head snapped up from the straw paper he was wrapping around his finger. "Yeah?"

She whirled the stool around so she was entirely facing him. "Why didn't you steal my car?"

The answer he gives her tells her that he'd been waiting for that question all night. He gives her a rare and lopsided smile, places an elbow on the wooden counter, and prods his head on his fist. "Because, McLean. Your number's worth a lot more than a one hundred thousand dollar Porsche."

"Eight hundred thousand," she corrects.

"Yeah, that. Or maybe a little more, who knows. Can I have the pleasure of having it now?"

Leo was an avid flirt, and on a particularly bad day, Piper would have avoided him like the plague. But tonight, seeing as how it was not one of those days, that the planets were in fact not aligned, and that the moon was waning and not full at all, she found him pretty endearing.

Piper jotted down her cell number on a bar napkin, then handed it to him. He gazed at it in his hands as if it were a relic.

"This is the best luck I've had with any girl in months," he confides, before carefully folding up the napkin and stuffing it into his pocket. Piper smirked at him.

"Congrats, then. You just scored one of the best." She sounded a tad bit conceited, but she didn't care. He knew it as well as she did.

The stuffiness of the bar dissolved into thinner air. Feeling much more comfortable and more open to the idea of letting people into her corner, Piper was about to ask him if he wanted to have a drink (water ha ha) when his phone rang.

Leo pulled it out of his jean pocket, and when he looked at the screen, he winced. "I got to go. Thanks for the night. Talk to you later?" She liked that fact that it was a question.

"Sure," Piper replied with a smile and a shrug, and with a slight wave, Leo left the bar. The burly alcoholics chose that poignant moment to spring out of their seats and yell in triumph, startling her to glance at her watch. It was almost midnight.

Piper finished her water and handed her glass to the bartender, deciding to put an end to a good day and a particularly good night.

* * *

Some time passed, and so did the night at the bar from her mind.

To be totally honest, her meeting with the repair boy hadn't re-entered her thoughts at all. She had shows to film, scripts to memorize - things to think about that were much more important than him. Because of this, a call from him was the last thing she expected to receive on her birthday.

She was at work, and it was almost a month since she'd been at the bar when her phone vibrated in her pocket. She glanced around the no-cellphone-policied room and stole behind a rack of costumes in the far corner before picking up.

"Hello?" said someone into the other line, and Piper didn't quite recognize the voice.

Her eyebrows drew together in confusion. A worker rolled past with a cart of confections and pastries, and the rumbling of it on the studio floors filled her ears.

"Who is this?"

_"Wait..."_ There was a shuffling noise on the other end. "Piper?"

It took her a moment, but her head finally made a connection. Wait a minute..._"Bar dude?"_

Bar dude snorted on the other line. _"One month and you already forgot my name, huh?"_

"Whatever," she said, and then a question came to mind. "Why the hell did you suddenly call me?"

There was a loud rickety noise on the other end that her brain interpreted as a train running over some tracks. _"Not exactly sure. I just found this random napkin with someone's number in my coat pocket, and naturally, I called it."_ His voice was loud and distinct despite all of the noise in the background. _"So what's going on with you?"_

Piper glanced around the set. Her co-star was busy talking to the director about something important, and everyone had taken five and was getting ready to film the next scene of the sitcom.

"I don't have much time to talk right now, but...a _lot _of stuff, actually. I'm at work right now, I have to go to my friend's house later, and I have to stop by the post office to pick up some presents."

_"Presents?"_ he asked, and she could almost see him scratching his head in confusion. _"Is it Christmas already?"_

"It's my birthday," she said, and she couldn't stop the smile that spread across her face even if she tried. She'd been looking forward to this day all year.

_"Oooooh. In that case, I shalt bake you a cake, m'lady."_

Piper thought she hadn't heard him right. "What?"

_"A cake,"_ he repeated, and she could picture him with the same goofy smile that he had given her at the bar._ "Every birthday needs a cake. How about you drop by my place and pick it up?"_

She opened her mouth, and closed it again. All of this was just a tad bit too much to take in.

"You're going to bake me a cake," she repeated.

_"Precisely."_

She smiled at the sheer ridiculousness of their conversation. "I don't even know where you live!"

_"That's what directions are for, right?"_

"Your _crazy."_

_"About birthdays. Now get in your car, rev up the engine, and get your butt over here so I can bake you a cake."_

Piper didn't see how she could argue with him, and to be frank, she didn't want to. "Okay, _fine, _sure, whatever. But if I get fired for leaving work early, I blame you."

_"Blame taken."_

* * *

She wasn't in the least surprised when she pulled into the driveway of a shabby, stereotypical Brooklyn home.

Not exactly a townhouse and not exactly an apartment, it was a little less than what Piper had expected it to be (a gate, fence, some sort of security would've been nice). The place that Leo seemingly called home was located in what many referred to as a bad neighborhood, in the district outskirts, a good driving distance away from Piper's place in Manhattan. She approached the house, and was about to knock on the front door (no doorbell) when, to her surprise, it swung open.

"Hey," said Leo with a smile. He was wearing a wrongly-buttoned plaid shirt and a pair of dark jeans. He stood to one side of the doorway and opened the door wide enough for her to enter. "Happy Birthday, _belleza__._ Come on in."

Hesitantly, Piper walked into the house, and the inside was messier than she anticipated.

The house looked smaller indoors than out. She walked down a small hallway which led into a living area, where a couch, a moderately-sized TV, and a shelf stacked with DVDs sat against various walls. There was a coffee table in the center of the room, and a doorway to her right led into a small kitchen, and the one to her left into a bedroom. There was a staircase that went up into darkness that she had seen at the entrance of the hall, and she couldn't help but wonder what creatures lurked up there.

The entire room smelled like cake, as if he had sprayed everything with bakery scented Febreze. Everything was covered in a fine layer of clothes, magazines, and tools. Leo threw a pile of mags that had been on the couch into a trash bin and motioned for her to sit down. She did.

Leo stuffed his hands into his pockets and stood in front of her as she assessed his living quarters. Her eyes skimmed over dark, undrawn curtains, various scraps of metal, and other miscellaneous things before resting back on him.

She made a clicking noise with her tongue and fiddled with her thumbs. "Well...nice place you got here."

He smirked down at her. "You don't have to lie."

She sighed and relaxed into the sofa. "Thank God."

Leo gave a breath that she knew was a laugh and sat down next to her, far enough so that they weren't touching in anyway. Her watched her as she kicked off her dreaded heels and settled down. When she felt comfortable enough, she turned to face him.

"So...what kind of cake?"

"Vanilla. Didn't know if you were allergic to chocolate. Or grains. Or eggs. Let's just call it a vegan cake."

"Vegan cakes are good," she gave him a cheeky smile of approval before stretching out and resting her feet on the coffee table. "I'm vegetarian, so it's not that much of a difference. Let's just hope it tastes good, hm?"

Leo gave her a smile and a short, breathy laugh before picking up the remote that had been sitting on the coffee table. He leaned forward into a sliver of light that had escaped from the drapes, and Piper could see a dark spot peeking out from his shirt, right at the back of his neck. Her eyebrows knit together in thought. A birthmark, maybe, or a scar.

He sat back, and the atmosphere suddenly became one shade more hostile. He shook the remote a bit before turning on the TV, and she watched with wary eyes as he leaned across her to reach the shelf, grabbing a stack of DVDs to sift through.

Leo turned to her and smiled. "Lets. Now, who wants to watch a movie?"

* * *

In the end, they ended up watching _The Karate Kid,_ the original. Leo had both versions, that one and the one with Will Smith's son, but when he tried to suggest watching that one instead she snapped and said, "No way in hell am I listening to Justin Bieber repeatedly say never," and that was that.

Somewhere along the line, Piper fell asleep. She had a weird dream that had mainly consisted of karate-fighting and movie deals, and when she woke up, the credits were rolling, an inspirational 80's song was playing, and...the room was _filled with smoke._

There was no high pitched chirping of a smoke detector, which confused her to no end. The first thing she could think to do was shove a sleeping Leo so hard that he fell off of the couch.

He fell to the mauve carpet with a very loud _thud _before springing to action and glaring at her. "What the _hell -"_

_"Fire, _you idiot," she hissed at him. Piper proceeded to crouch to the floor and smack him in the head.

"We overslept! Your effing cake got burned and now there's smoke and - _why the hell don't you have a smoke detector?"_

"I dismantled it," he said. He sounded less panicked and more agitated than she thought he would."It got annoying, okay? I didn't think I'd actually _need _it..."

"Well, you _do," _she hissed back at him before surveying their surroundings. From the space in between the coffee table and the couch, with Leo crouched in front of her, she couldn't see much. The smoke wasn't thick enough to cloak the entire room, and she would've been able to see just fine if the sun hadn't decided to set. What she could see was the glow of the time on the cable box through the glass of the table, the faded beige-ish/mauve-ish color of the rugged carpet beneath her, the unarrayed once-a-stack of DVDs that had toppled down with Leo, and the beleaguered look in the said pain-in-the-rear's eyes.

Entirely irritated with the lack of breathing air and the limited moving space, Piper smacked him again.

The assault made a satisfying sound against his skull, and his eyes bore into her into what Leo must've thought had been a withering gaze. She thought he'd curse and it'd be over with, but he hissed something at her that was much more appropriate.

"Hitting me won't solve anything, you know."

"Shut up," she replied before shuffling back out of the space she was in. Her plan was to crawl into the kitchen, make it to the oven without dying from asphyxiation, and turn the thing off.

He looked at her with a look of confusion, one hand still clenching his skull. "What- " He stopped, realized what she was doing, and promptly shuffled forward until they were side by side. Crouched low and gripping the carpet to the right of the couch, Piper turned to him.

"How long did you put it in for, an hour?"

"I think so," he replied, his eyebrows knitting together in thought. "At least, I think that's how long it was supposed to be in for. Now that I think about it, if the movie was two hours long, and the thing's still in there, then I guess I was wrong."

"Well that helps a ton," she rolled her eyes as she crawled forwards, towards the kitchen.

It took them a while, but they got there. The air above them was thicker with smoke and the smog hung in low places, but the source of the heat was easy to find. The oven, which was a few feet off to her left, spat out smoke from every side, which curled up into the air in billows and rolls and made her eyes sting and water uncontrollably. She opened her mouth to say something before she inhaled a whiff, and she found herself in a series of coughs.

When her vision cleared, she was surprised to see Leo by her side, on his knees and rising to his feet, wading through the smoke despite it's thickness and dashing in fluid movements towards the stove. She let out a ragged and ugly cough into her sleeve as her eyebrows drew together, the corners of her mouth twisting down and in the position to scold him when his hand turned a knob, he leaned down, opened the stove, threw whatever had been inside into the trashcan to it's right, and it was over. The heat and the smog still lingered, but it was over.

Leo reappeared in front of her, a hand reaching down towards her. She coughed again, still getting over the smoke, but she grabbed it, and she found herself on her feet. She removed her arm from in front of her mouth and stared at him, panting and giving the occasional cough. His look was almost indecipherable.

As she stared at him, it slowly dawned on her that Leo hadn't been coughing at all. When she looked at him, she noticed the tiniest things - like how the first few buttons on his shirt were unbuttoned and how he wore it untucked, and the sweat on his brow and the heat that was around them and other stupid things like that. Her eyes swept over him, his shoulder, his jaw, his eyes - he wasn't disheveled at all, except for a clump of curly hair that stuck up at an odd angle. Piper wondered how she looked - probably horrible - and realized with a start that she had in fact been checking him out and that he was doing the same right then. Her hand twitched in his grasp, and it struck her that he was still holding her hand when he felt it and let go, wiping his hand on his jeans.

They kept panting. He took a breath for each gap she left behind.

Leo spoke up first. "Um..." He turned and gazed at the kitchen, thin curls of smoke wafting up into the air. The oven itself looked like it couldn't take much more, and was burnt and charred in places. Her eyebrows came together in thought of why she was even bothering with this guy, when he smiled sheepishly at her.

He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. "Happy Birthday."

* * *

Piper bought him an oven.

After some investigation, Leo discovered that his old one had had several mysterious perforations that had made way to leakage ("So _that's _why it got so hot whenever I baked..." "You _dumbass.")_. Piper, being her nice and stinking rich self, went shopping, found the kitchen appliance in question, slapped a bow on it, and gave it to him as a seven-month-early Christmas present.

Weeks had passed since that incident, and Piper got the occasional call from Leo every once in a while. She hadn't seen him since when she'd given him the oven, which she'd counted as a blessing, and spent most of her time with her friend's imbecile fiancee, Percy Jackson.

"So, what's his name again?" Percy asked, his voice repetitively loud and then receding and he spun around the room in a swivel chair.

Piper, who was lying on her back on the bed to his left, craned her neck to look at him. "Leo. I told you already."

"What's..." Percy took a moment to play with the lever under the chair to alter it's height. He pressed it down before sinking down, nearly level with the floor. "...his last name?"

"It's..." she trailed off, stunned when she came up with a blank. She was pretty sure that she had known it at some point.

"Don't know?" Percy asked from across the room, and she hesitantly nodded. "Well, find it out. How am I supposed to do a background check if I don't know his last name?"

"You're not supposed to do one at _all," _Piper reasoned, and she pushed herself up so that she was lying on her elbows. Her back ached from lying down for so long.

"We're not _dating _or anything. I just met him at a bar and he burned my birthday cake, that's all. Besides," Piper pushed one arm off of the bed and rolled over so that she was on her stomach. "Who made _you _relationship police? I thought that was Annabeth's job."

"Annabeth's not here right now," said Percy with a smirk, his chin resting at the top of the headrest. "Lucky for you, she's at a smartass convention for the next couple of weeks. Don't tell her I said that."

Piper was so telling her that he said that. "There's no reason you should have to check him out. I mean, he seems pretty decent - excluding the fact that he nearly burned his house down with me in it. And he's fixes stuff, which is cool. He fixed my engine some months ago. He could check out your car for you, too..."

She went on and on until it turned into a ramble about Leo's good qualities. Percy watched her with a growing smirk, and when she was finally done talking, her eyebrows came together in confusion.

Piper blinked. "What?"

His smirk threatened to tear his face in half. "You two aren't dating, remember?"

That earned him a pillow in the face.

* * *

Later that week, she was at her place, surfing the channels on TV and looking for one that currently _didn't_ play a soap opera when her phone rang.

It took her a good while to rummage through a great deal of blankets and pillows before she found her bag. She fished around inside and was surprised that it was still ringing when she pulled it out with a mass of credit cards.

She didn't check to see who it was. All she did was tap the screen, hold it up to her ear, and say, "It took me ten minutes to find this so this better be fucking good."

She heard a laugh on the other line. _"Hi to you too, Pipes."_ Leo. She was relieved. Anyone but Percy would've been fine.

"Hey," she said, her free hand reaching for the remote. She fumbled with it before finding the power button and turning off the TV. "Why the sudden call?"

_"Well..."_ Leo trailed off, and she raised an involuntary eyebrow (which she did a lot when it came to him). _"I was just using my new, hella rad oven when I remembered that I owed a certain someone a birthday cake. Or, at least something equivalent to a birthday cake, like dinner maybe. At my place. Tonight."_

It took her more than a moment to process this. The hum of the dryer in the other room was the only noise as the remote threatened to fall from her hands and onto the floor.

She narrowed her eyes at nothing in particular. "Did you just..."

_"Absolutely."_

"You're an idiot, you know that? A lucky idiot who knows how to pick desperate girls," As she said it, he gave a breathy laugh. Piper rolled her eyes and shook her head, trying to think at exactly what point she had gotten herself into this mess. "I'll be over in an hour, on my own time. Wear something nice 'cause I feel like being pretty tonight. And brush your hair, for God's sake. The thing's a rat's nest." By the time she was done, the corners of her mouth had stretched out into a smile, and she was delighted in the thought that she'd have something to do that involved something other than her job. She was _really _glad that Percy wasn't there to hear this.

Piper nearly squealed. She was going on a date with Leo.

* * *

"Leo?"

Crickets chirped in the grass around them. Leo tugged on his collar, dug his chopsticks into his bowl, and looked up from his lo mein. "Yeah?"

"Um..." she scratched her head, which was hard, because her bun made it hard to scratch anything. "What's your last name?"

The two of them were eating outside tonight, on Piper's suggestion. They ate in Leo's backyard, which was small, but good for the occasion. There was an old, weathered fountain that was grounded in one corner of the yard, which listed dangerously to one side but wasn't going to fall, and yard tools on the back porch that were rusted over. Also on the porch was a small table, and two rickety lawn chairs that had holes in various places. The yard itself was patchy in places and the ground was uneven, but the bright side was that the back was fenced off with a tall picket fence that you couldn't see over unless you stood, so she guessed that it could've been worse.

Because Piper no longer trusted Leo with an oven, they had ordered Chinese. Leo was chowing down on lo mein while she was entirely content with a container of veggie dumplings. The stars were out, the night was warm, and he had hung a bunch of Christmas lights on some poles so that they're little dining alfresco would look more romantic and less pathetic. Surprisingly, it worked.

Piper was admiring the tableau when he answered her question. "Valdez."

His voice pulled her back into reality. "What?"

"My last name's Valdez," Leo repeated with a small smile, stirring his chopsticks in his meal. "Did I tell you before? I thought I did."

"You didn't," she assured him as her eyes were drawn down towards her food, her hand reaching for her fork once again. "I tried to tell someone what it was the other day, but I drew a blank."

"It's always good to know your future last name, right?" The smirk he wore was the complete opposite of her scowl.

"Stuff some food into your mouth before I stuff something else inside."

"Your tongue?"

"My _fist."_ she glared at him from across the table, but felt the heat leave her face in a flush. She quickly brought her paper cup to her lips to hide it, taking a sip of the punch inside. Leo was _entirely_ impossible.

She stole a glance at him as he chuckled, looking at his food at not her. Speaking of Leo, he knew how to clean up.

Tonight, Mr. Valdez wore a white, collared button-down (he seemed to like those), suspenders, and pinstripe pants. It was evident that he had heeded her request and tried to grease his hair back, but it kept sticking up in random places. Leo kind of looked like one of those cheesy actors from one of her dad's movies, but he didn't look _that _bad - not really bad at all.

She had zoned out, again. She was staring at him, and she didn't realize that he was doing the same to her until a sharp ring pierced the air.

They both jumped. Piper fumbled with her cup and Leo with his chopsticks, and his hand crept to his pocket but stopped in it's tracks when she pulled out her phone from her bag.

"Sorry," she muttered in apology before standing, tugging down her dress and retreating to the porch for privacy. Her wedges were wobbly and uneven against the hard packed dirt of the lawn, so she hurriedly stumbled over to the back porch and climbed the splintered wooden steps.

She let out a breath that she hadn't realized she'd been holding before glancing at her phone, gripping the porch rail. It was Hazel.

Piper tapped the screen and held the phone to her ear, turning her back to Leo and biting her lip. She could feel his gaze on her from across the yard.

"Hello?"

_"Hey Piper!"_ Her friend sounded cheerful and happy. An array of different noises filled the phone - laughter, shouting, and other things that made Piper wonder where her friend was.

"Where _are _you?"

_"L.A.,"_ Hazel said, and Piper remembered that Hazel was back in California and that her trip to NYC was over. _"Frank and I've been hanging with Jason and Reyna. They took us down here from Berkeley earlier today, and we went to an amusement park. Oh my gosh, you should've seen Frank - we went on a rollercoaster and the look on his face was priceless!"_ Hazel laughed a cheerful, giddish laugh that only she could pull off. Sure it was funny, and yes, it sounded great, but Piper's eyes darted back to the table, where Leo sat, picking at his food and pretending not to be eavesdropping.

Hazel continued on. _"...and they were_ amazing._ Anyways, we just got back from the mall, and I just called to see if - "_

_"Hazel,"_ Piper didn't mean to sound harsh, but she hissed her friend's name into the phone so severely that even she had to wince. "I can't talk right now, okay? I'm sorry, but I'm _really_ busy right now and I have to get back to- "

_"What?"_

Piper inhaled, then exhaled, glancing at Leo. "I'm on a_ date, _okay?"

Hazel took a long and precious moment to reply. _"Oh."_

She sighed. She'd never hear the end of this.

"Oh," Hazel said again, and she sounded to her as if she had just comprehended something, something Piper didn't quite understand. _"Well, you could've said that _before _I started rambling. Call me later, okay? Be ready with details."_

_"Goodbye,_ Hazel," said Piper with a roll of her eyes and a relieved exhale, and then the conversation was over. She hung up after her, and then turned back to face Leo, who looked away as soon as she looked at him and pretended to be interested in his food. Piper shook her head at his stupidity and ambled off of the porch before making her way back over to him.

She sat down in her chair, which made a squeaking noise. "Sorry about that. It was just a friend of mine calling to see if everything was okay."

"Mm," Leo said in reply, which was all he could say because he had stuffed a mouthful of noodles in his mouth in his haste to make it look like he hadn't overheard. "S'okay. Juth tell them I said hi."

Piper smiled. She leaned her head on her hand and watched this passing excuse for a man as he stuffed more lo mein into his face. Around them, the crickets chirped softly, a breeze threw the grass to one side, and she could hear jubilant sounds of laughter from the world beyond the fence. Her mind drifted away into some secluded place far, far away, and it had completely passed her thoughts that she was on a date when Leo leaned across the table towards her.

She snapped back into reality. Piper felt the heat rise into her cheeks, and leaned back into her chair as he leaned forward.

Her eyes went wide. "What- "

"Wait..." he said before touching her cheek, and she went rigid in trepidation. Then he swept his thumb over the edge of her mouth, and moved his hand away.

She blinked at him. It took him a few seconds to realize that she had no idea what the hell that was for. "There was food on your face," he tried to explain, and Piper was relieved. She looked at him, and it occurred to her that the situation was entirely ironic because he had some food on _his _face, too.

She leaned forward, reaching out, and Leo leaned back. She saw his face flush as his hands gripped the sides of the seat of his chair.

"What ar- "

She wiped it off. Piper sat back in satisfaction, thoroughly pleased that she had put the same amount of emotional tension on him.

"You had food on your face," she said with a smirk. Leo rolled his eyes, but then he had a look on his face that told her that he was up to no good. To her slight shock and surprise, Leo leaned forward again. For a second she thought that he'd just do it again, and the gag would go on until she ended it, but something else happened - something entirely unexpected, unexplainable, and probably not complainable.

The stars shone brighter and the moon shone fuller, illuminating the clouds around it and all the world below. Leo kissed her, and when her arms found their way around his neck and her hands into his hair, she realized with a pang of pleasure that she didn't have a problem with that.

* * *

"Percy?" she yelled at the top of her lungs. No reply.

Piper finished braiding her hair, twisting one of the braids around her finger over and over as she shoved a drawer closed with her hip.

"Percy," she called again. Again, no answer. Piper stopped playing with her braid and picked up the basket full of clothing that was lying on the table to her right, and balanced it against her hip. Then she leaned down and picked up the articles of clothing around her, stuffing Percy's dirty boxers down to the bottom of the pile.

She sighed and scratched her head, annoyed. Going to see if everything was okay, Piper set the basket back down on the card table and padded out of the room.

She descended the staircase, jumping over the step that was faulty and ready to collapse, and then walked down the hallway before making a right into one room and then a left into the area that was Annabeth's office.

Sunlight poured in through the blinds of the window; particles danced around in the thick air as Piper put her hands on her hips. There was Percy, back to her, his gaze glued on the monitor.

Piper pursed her lips. "Why didn't you answer me?"

At first, he didn't budge. Piper was about to stride across the room and move his limbs for him when she heard the creak of the chair swiveling around, and Percy, looking a lot more tired and concerned than usual, ran a hand along the stubble on his chin before rubbing the back of his neck and letting his hand fall down into his lap.

She opened her mouth to utter a snippy rebuttal when he cut her off and the words died in her throat. "Your boyfriend's last name is Valdez, right?"

Piper had no idea where he was going with this. "I don't see what this has to do with- "

_"Right?" _His sharp tone cut right into the serenity and calmness of the morning. She felt an odd feeling in her chest, and tension began to flood the room, suffocating her.

"Yes," her voice sounded skeptical and small, quiet and nervous. "Why'd you ask?"

The serious look that was directed before her was unlike anything she had ever seen on Percy Jackson.

"I searched him up. Your boyfriend's an arsonist."

Her train of thought derailed and combusted on the spot. For once, she was at a loss for words.

* * *

...


	2. II

**Summary (I do these per chapter now yay):**_ He's not an arsonist, he's Leo. Piper comforts herself in the thought that there's a difference._

_**A/N: **__Part II (woot woot)._

_Thanks for reviewing, people. I really appreciate it! I hope that you guys liked reading the first chapter as much as I liked writing it! :)_

_A quick and brief thank you to my long-time Beta, AvisQuest9513, who edited this chapter. Thanks Avis! :D_

_P.S., I borrowed a line or two from Distant Waves by Suzzane Weyn (sue me)._

_P.S.S., for LeoValdezlover, an arsonist is a person who _"intentionally and maliciously sets fire to buildings,  
wildland areas, vehicles or other property with the intent to cause damage."_ - thank you google._

_Hope you like it, my darlings. c:_

* * *

**_..._**

**_Ignite_**

**II**

**...**

* * *

Percy looked at Piper through the rear-view mirror and sighed.

"You have to break up with him."

At this, Piper craned her neck up from her awkward position against guitar cases and gym bags to scowl at his poor acumen. The two of them were in the car, him driving, her in the backseat. Strayed beams of sunlight peeked through the trees and into the vehicle, glaring bright against the leather seating.

Her eyebrows furrowed. _"What?"_

"Dump him," Percy said, and the austere look he directed over his shoulder told her that he was being serious and not making a suggestion at all. "It's the only way to avoid getting hurt, at this point."

She exhaled, and the annoyance she felt was enough to fuel her words as she opened her mouth to contradict him. She was about to speak, but her mouth shut itself after a moment of thought. The sheer ethic in what he was saying would overpower anything that she could come up with.

The two of them were currently traveling over the speed limit to JFK, where Annabeth's flight had just arrived. She had just gotten back from her convention – some architect thing where all they did was learn stuff and argue about who had the better design – and Piper was glad to have her back. House-sitting was tiring, and having no one to talk to but Percy for two weeks drove her nearly insane (not to say that Percy's a bad conversationalist, but a girl's got to have some variety). She had had no choice – especially since Annabeth wouldn't let Percy watch the house for reasons that were not-so-beyond her.

Her eyes skimmed over the influx of cars lined up outside of the car window, slugging down the freeway at a pace slower than molasses. Her vision was a blur of bumpers and red lights and car tags, but even that did not stop her thoughts from echoing in her mind, repeating Percy's words and her own doubts.

_"Piper."_

"Huh?"

Percy furrowed his eyebrows at her. He opened his mouth to say something, but sighed.

Instead, he raised an eyebrow. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," she snapped before rolling down her window and letting the air come in. It felt stuffy in the car – she couldn't breathe.

"No, you're not," Percy stated in his matter-of-fact, _I'm-on-a-roll-so-don't-interrupt-me_ tone, "I'm sorry if I've upset you, but you and I _both_ know that he's danger –"

"Can we _please_ not talk about it anymore?" she asked in a harsher tone than she had hoped for.

Percy set his jaw. "Fine." The summer air rushing in from the window turned cold, and his eyes wandered from her reflection and fortunately diverted their attention back onto the road.

There was moment of silence before she said softly, "I just don't want to talk right now, okay?"

Thankfully, he didn't answer.

Sneaking her head out of the car window, she focused her thoughts on her surroundings. She stared out at the clusters of buildings and tall, lush, green trees. There was no traffic in their direction, which was surprising; the road was mostly clear – free, even. But the wind sure as hell wasn't. Her hair whipped violently in the gale, hitting her face like tiny hurricanes, but, despite this, a small smile tugged at her lips.

When the roar of jet engines sounded, her eyes flew to the sky. A plane sliced through the air before disappearing behind a fenced off ring of trees, signaling that they were at the airport.

The pick-up was quick. It took Percy ten minutes and three turns to find the front entrance (JFK was a very confusing airport, mind you). He parked the car and then got out, saying, "I'll be right back," before disappearing into a sea of people and suitcases.

Bored out of her mind, Piper closed her eyes and listened to the sound of angry car horns and screeching tires, jet engines and the hissing of buses as they came to a halt. She was still upset with him. She normally didn't hold grudges for this long, but she was mad – mad at Percy for thinking that breaking up was even an option.

She immersed herself in the moment, and when she opened her eyes, Percy and Annabeth were heading straight for the car with Percy holding her luggage. Annabeth waved to her, all smiles, and she mustered a smile and returned the gesture.

There were some hugs. Percy packed her suitcases in the trunk, and Annabeth took that as the perfect opportunity to regard her with useless facts that she had learned during her trip.

"Did you know that the Taj Mahal is 561 feet tall?" Annabeth asked her with a gleam in her eye, and no, she didn't. "And the central dome is 58 feet in diameter, and the dome itself is 213 feet tall, which is really impressive. Plus, it's regarded as a major world cultural center and -"

"Save it for home, will you?" Percy asked with a smile as he slid into the driver's seat. "You just got back. How about you eat before you ramble?"

"I was not _rambling,"_ Annabeth said, her cheeks a tad pink.

Percy rolled his eyes, kissed her on the cheek, and muttered, "Yes, you were."

Ugh. She rolled her eyes and grimaced as the ogling officially began.

They drove off towards the city. Thirty-five minutes and one traffic jam later, Percy took a random exit and they ended up at a McDonald's that was closer to home than not.

The line at the drive through was long.

"I'll go inside," Percy said, "What do you guys want?"

Annabeth wanted her ritualistic hamburger and fries, and Piper sent him for a salad and an apple pie. Her thoughts were currently elsewhere, and as soon as Percy disappeared inside of the fast food joint, Annabeth reeled around to face her.

Piper opened her mouth to inquire, but the blonde's serious gaze cut her off.

"Listen, we have approximately five minutes before he comes back out, so let's make this quick. Something's wrong, isn't there? What is it?"

Piper was half startled, half surprised. It amazed her how she often forgot how discerning Annabeth Chase could be.

Annabeth narrowed her eyes at her. "Did Percy do something stupid?"

"No," she replied quickly. It wouldn't have been the first time. On the other hand, he technically did, but Piper didn't think that her friend would agree.

"It's something else," she said, trying not to back off from her stare.

A shadow of confusion and concern passed over Annabeth's face, and Piper found it two times harder to look her in the eye. "What? What is it?"

"I, um, met a guy."

The next few facial expressions Annabeth made were some rather interesting ones. Piper witnessed a look of confusion, shock, and delighted surprise cross her friend's features.

_"Oh,"_ her voice was soft and airy, and Piper couldn't help but think back on Hazel's same reaction. The atmosphere in the car turned one shade more awkward. "Okay, then. What's he like?"

"Um," Piper scratched the back of her neck, because now she felt itchy and weird and awkward, and a bunch of other feelings she didn't like to experience much. "He's cute, I guess, and kind of short. And he's nice. Sort of."

The dull look Annabeth gave her told her that he did not sound quite interesting at all. "Anything that doesn't describe a great deal of the male population?"

"He's a mechanic. Does that count?"

Annabeth gave her a leery look that made the hairs at the base of her neck stand on end. She could tell that something was seriously wrong, but Piper didn't want to say a thing.

Annabeth raised an eyebrow, the look still on her face. _"Okay,_ anything _important_ about him?"

"Not really. He took me out a couple of times, but that was it."

Annabeth opened her mouth to weed out more information when Piper spotted Percy across the parking lot, and she followed her gaze. The blonde set her jaw and sent a fixed glare at her before turning around, and Percy slid back into the car.

"The line was long," he said as he dug into the bag to make sure that they had gotten his order right. "I won't even begin to understand why the hell they felt the need to put the ketchup at the very back of the restaurant."

Piper brooded to herself just as Annabeth did. The foul atmosphere in the car must've been pretty obvious, because Percy eventually trailed off and raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"Nothing," Piper muttered for the both of them, because she was extremely irritated with them now, and when she thought about it, she should have said 'nothing' in the first place.

* * *

She knocked on the door with a shaking hand, and wiped the other on her jeans. Standing on the faded welcome mat and shuffling her weight between her feet, she nervously chewed her lip.

It was humid outdoors, vaguely typical of early July, and the climate escalated as the day went on. Cicadas buzzed amidst laden oak branches. Robins and sparrows chirped a sweet summer song as they swam in lazy circles overhead. The hot, summer sun beat down on her, tanning her to the point where she was pretty sure she'd go home looking like a Californian orange, and she wished that he would get off of his lazy butt and hurry up and open the door.

She was at Leo's house. The two of them were currently in that weird _He's-Not-My-Boyfriend_ state where two people kiss, ignore each other for a few days, and then everything suddenly becomes awkward. Of course, the whole_ 'he's-not-my-boyfriend-but-he-kind-of-is-but-then-it-turns-out-that-he's-an-arsonist'_ thing threw a curve ball, and she didn't really know what to do about it besides confront it head on. The problem was that she hated confronting problems, and her brain had a hard time processing that the guy she liked was one of them.

In other words, she was going to break up with him. Or at least, she was going to try.

Her eyes darted to the door when she heard a scuttling noise inside. She heard a thump, then a loud swear. Her heart crept into her throat when the door opened to reveal a shirtless Leo Valdez rubbing his sore head.

"Hey," he said in-between a grimace.

Leo's curly hair seemed curlier, and it amazed her how gnarly one's stubble could become in four days. He wore a pair old jeans, and no shoes, and he quickly pulled a comb from his mass of hair and threw it off into the depths of his household. The sun sent a ray of light into the darkness of his home, illuminating the hallway like a gilded pathway.

"Hi," she said in a voice so small, she was sure that it wasn't hers. "I was just in the neighborhood, and -"

Leo held up a hand with a look that she couldn't decipher. _"Wait."_

Piper was freaked as hell when he grabbed her arm, and she tensed. Her mind was rushing at a mile a minute when he pulled her inside, and she was wondering whether or not she'd be charbroiled to death when he shut the door behind him with the kick of a foot, and leaned down, and his mouth was on hers.

Leo tasted like coffee. That was pretty much the only thing she could think of, her mind momentarily being turned to putty as the kiss dragged on. When he pulled away, she felt her cheeks redden, and she figured that there was no point in hiding it.

She raised an eyebrow at him, half shocked, half elated. "What was that for?"

"I wanted to see if kissing you in here was as good as kissing you out in the yard."

Goodness gracious, her cheeks were on fire now. "And?"

"Even better."

Her thoughts became a hasty and slurred compilation of swears and curses, because _how the fuck was she supposed to end this?_

"So," he began with a not-so-innocent looking smile, and her focus was back on him. He leaned down close to the point where she felt like he was drawing her in. "What brings you to _La Casa del Valdez,_ Señorita McLean? _¿Estás perdida?"_

"I, um, was in the neighborhood, and figured that I should drop by," she stammered with what she figured was a standard pretty girl smile. She was lying, of course - no one on earth would just be driving through that neighborhood, and she didn't really feel like dropping by, but she still said it, anyway.

Leo smiled at her, and it took all of her willpower to stop her heart from fluttering and flying out the window. "Good thing you did. I got this movie yesterday, and I thought that it would just be a _shame_ to watch it alone..."

"Okay," she squeaked, and it had almost passed her mind that she was in the arms of an alleged arsonist, and not a major crush.

She settled down on the couch as Leo put the movie in the DVD player. She watched him as he did (she was not staring at his butt nope not at all), and he sat down on the couch next to her. She tried not to sit close, she really did, but it was hard to sit next to a human magnet and _not_ feel attracted.

She gave in, and sat close to him, despite the searing summer heat. Leo grabbed the remote, pressed a button, and standard movie stuff starting rolling across the screen.

Something about it looked familiar to her. Not knowing exactly what movie it was, she turned to ask. "What movie is-"

"Shush."

Leo put a finger over her lips before pointing to the screen with the remote. The corners of his mouth were upturned, and slowly tugged at a smile. That set off an alarm - something must've been seriously wrong.

She looked back, and the screen faded to black. Then, all of a sudden, a group of overly hunky middle-aged men in battle armor appeared on screen.

Piper's heart crept into her throat again, and her nails dug into Leo's arm. "No."

The screen tightened on the warrior in the center, and her hand reached for one of the couch pillows. She grabbed it and stuffed her face into it. _"Please,_ no. Turn it off, turn it off!"

He only laughed.

_"- Come, men. We must fight!"_

"Oh God!" Piper shrieked into the pillow, and she couldn't bring herself to watch. The movie- it was-_ it was-_

The words 'King of Sparta' appeared on the screen amidst all of the fighting and gore, and most importantly, her father.

When the words faded away, Leo paused the movie, and the room was filled with nothing but Piper's groans and his laughter.

_"¡Dios mio!_ You should have seen your face!" Leo hunched over in laughter at the sheer and unseen hilariousness of Piper's reaction, and her face flushed a deep red.

"You fucking asshole!" she said, and she could feel the heat steadily rising in her cheeks. She removed the pillow from over her face and began hitting him wit it. "I hate that fucking movie! Why the hell would you think I'd want to watch _that_ piece of crap!"

He was still laughing, but it was dying down with every blow she delivered to his face. "I didn't – which is _kind_ of why I rented it. You want to watch something else instead, then?"

_"No,"_ she snapped, because her cheeks still red. Tossing the pillow to the floor, she crossed her arms. "I don't want to watch your crappy movies anymore."

Leo raised an eyebrow, the impish smirk still on his face. "Then what do you want to do?"

He waited for an answer with raised eyebrows and a smirk, and her angered simmered down. Crap, she didn't know. Part of her wanted to leave Leo and his sorry ass alone, but then the other part wanted to make out with him. She had no clue where the latter came from, but hey, it didn't seem like a really bad idea.

She huffed before making up her mind. In two expeditious movements, she grabbed his shoulders and threw a leg over his lap. Piper was entirely satisfied with Leo's wide-eyed reaction as she hovered over him, and she leaned down next to his ear.

"You're a lucky little asshole, you know that?"

He smiled. "I'm aware."

Sweet Jesus, this boy was something else. Entirely done, she leaned down to have their mouths clash together.

He kissed her back, and it was bliss. Somewhere along the line, she heard something clatter to the floor, and a rolling noise. All Leo could do was mutter a quick _"Fuck,"_ as the batteries to his remote rolled under his couch and into a vent, into a void of no return.

* * *

"So you _didn't_ break up with him?" Percy said, wide-eyed as he stuffed more fries into his face.

_"No,"_ said Piper as she covered her face in shame. Her mouth twisted down in a wince. She _knew_ he'd be mad at her. "I like him, okay? Breaking up is out of the question right now, because I really don't want to do it."

They were at the food court of the Manhattan Mall. Even though Annabeth was back, Piper still found herself hanging with Percy "Seaweed Brain" Jackson and his disapproval of her relationship.

The court was alive with buzz and chatter as people chowed down on their food. Percy glared at her, but she couldn't take the ill-meant gesture seriously in that his cheeks were so full of food, he looked like a bloated chipmunk. "If you were over there for so long, what did you two do?"

Piper blushed, but just a little. She opened her mouth to answer, but Percy's eyes went wide, and he held up a hand to cut her off. "You know what, scratch that. I don't want to know."

She felt her face go red as she realized what Percy was implying. _"Oh my gosh,_ we didn't -"

"I didn't say that you did, okay?" He held up his hands in defense as he swallowed a mouthful. "Forget I asked."

She stared at him as he stuffed another burger into his face. She didn't have any food, she wasn't hungry right then, and seeing her friend inhale such large quantities of meat products didn't really spark her appetite.

Percy swallowed. "If you're not breaking up with him, then you have to do something else. Maybe we could call the authorities?"

"Why the hell would you suggest _that?"_ she said, causing Percy to stare at her, a tad slack-jawed, "He hasn't done anything _wrong._ Don't people have to commit _crimes_ in order to get arrested?"

"Okay, okay, fine, I'll come up with something else later," he replied, but Piper couldn't fight the miffed feeling she got in her chest. She knew that Percy was making suggestions out of care, but he was getting her really upset.

She didn't want to reveal the extent of her annoyance, so she avoided eye-contact. Rays of bright sunlight hit the golden archways above them, and her gaze flew to one of the windows. The sun was steadily making its descent down the sky, and she figured that now would be a good time to head off.

"We should go," she said finally. She was still annoyed at him, and his implication was still on her mind - her cheeks were still faintly red. "Are you done eating?"

Percy wiped his hands on a napkin and chewed the last bits of his sandwich. He took a sip of his lemonade, disposed of his trash in the trash bin to his right, and stood up before swallowing what was in his mouth and letting out a belch.

"Excuse me, and yes. Let's go."

* * *

Weeks passed. Piper had allowed the whole 'arsonist' thing to go unnoticed for now. She had meant what she said at the mall – she _did_ like Leo, and spending time with him was something she found rather enjoyable.

She was at his house again (despite Percy's grudging disapproval), and the two of them were in the kitchen. Leo was cooking dinner (yes, she allowed him to use the stove this time). She was busy setting the table, and whatever-it-was that he was brewing smelled absolutely delicious. Her nose couldn't help but pursue the aroma all the way back to the stove, where she rested her head on Leo's shoulder as he mixed broths into a pot.

"As the royal taste tester, I demand a royal test taste," she said as she opened her mouth for a spoonful, but he only offered her a smirk in return.

"As the royal _cook,_ I demand that you wait until it's done," he replied, and she frowned. The smell wafting up and into the air made her even hungrier.

Piper pouted as her stomach demanded food. "Please?"

"It's not done yet."

"If I eat some now, will I die?"

"Probably not."

She opened her mouth. "Feed me."

Leo rolled his eyes and gave in, placing a spoonful in her mouth. The soup melted in her mouth and warmed her down to her toes. She licked her lips - she wanted another taste. "What kind of soup is this?"

"Five-bean," he said before reaching up into a cabinet above the stove and pulling out a couple of spices, "Yesterday, I bought a bunch of beef to make beef stew, but then I remembered that you were a vegetarian. You need to eat meat sometime, it'll be a lot easier for me to remember."

"Thanks for the offer, but no," she smiled before pecking him on the cheek as he added the spices to the soup. She eyed the pot with hungry eyes. "Dump some of that in a bowl for me, will you? It tastes pretty done to me."

She went back to finish setting the table for two, and Leo tasted the soup. He judged in her favor that it was done, and moments later, the two of them were at the table eating their meal. The conversation was dry but alive as the two of them fished for reasonable topics.

"How are things going at work?" She asked in between spoonfuls.

Leo stirred his soup and was quiet for a moment as a frown displayed itself on his face. Piper's eyebrows furrowed in concern, she could tell that something was wrong.

"Not so good," he said in a low voice, and his tone made her eyebrow arch. "The pay's getting lower, and I'm actually thinking of moving on. I've been trying to get a deal on this garage a town over, but with my paycheck getting smaller and the price getting higher as the months go by..." Leo trailed off, rubbing the back of his neck and averting his gaze in a way that made her throat tighten.

"Oh," she said in a small, clipped voice that made Leo's gaze meet hers. Her mind went ahead of her, and it slightly befuddled her why Leo suddenly narrowed his eyes at her.

_"Don't,"_ he said quickly, and her eyebrows shot up in surprise.

She blinked, twiddling with her thumbs. "Don't what?"

"I want to buy the garage _myself,_ Pipes. You are _not_ going to buy it for me."

Crap, he was a lot smarter than he first let on. "Who said I was?"

Leo crossed his arms and shook his head at her, an unbelieving smile on his face. "No one had to say it. I _know_ you, Beauty Queen."

_...Shit._

Piper huffed as she sank back into her chair, her plans foiled. She was kind of looking forwards to astonishing her boyfriend with a brand-spanking-new garage.

She finished her soup, still piqued at not being able to help, and Leo, who was already done, picked up both of their bowls and stacked them. He held them in one hand, and was about to head for the sink when he halted. Piper was taken by surprise when he leaned down and kissed her on the cheek, and she blushed.

Leo whispered in her ear, his every word tickling her. "Thanks for trying, anyway."

She blushed harder, and while Leo washed the dishes, she realized that to say that she 'liked' him was an understatement. The word she was looking for was a little bit stronger than that.

* * *

After dinner, Leo turned on the TV. They had watched two and a half episodes of Golden Girls before they somehow ended up making out, and whatever was on TV after that was a blur.

Somewhere in the midst of it all, Piper discovered that the soup was thinner than she had made it out to be.

They had one more round before she broke away, biting her lip. "I have to pee."

Leo snorted. "Thanks for sharing."

She couldn't help but roll her eyes at her oh-so-stoic boyfriend. "No, I mean I really have to use the bathroom. Where is it?"

"Upstairs," he said offhandedly, retracting his arms from around her waist and putting them behind his head. "Third door to the left."

Piper untangled herself from him and stood up from the couch, the glow of the TV illuminating the room and everything in it in a dull light. "I'll be right back."

She went down the hallway, which was dim with the light of the television from the den. She made her way to the staircase, and felt around the wall for a light switch. When she found none, she muttered a complaint under her breath about the 'fucking vampire' that her boyfriend was turning into, and started heading up the stairs.

Each step creaked under her weight, and the question crossed her mind if she had been eating enough salad. She ascended into another hallway above and felt around the wall again, but still didn't find a switch. Piper made a face in the darkness. She couldn't help but wonder if Leo really _was_ a vampire.

Third door to the left. There were three doors on each side of the corridor, and one at the end of the hall. Piper walked down the hallway, and in one of those moments when the 'left' and 'right' sides were mistaken for each other, she opened the third door to the right.

Unlike before, her hand found a switch, and she turned on the lights. Her eyes widened.

She had stumbled into Leo's bedroom.

The room was a mess. The sheets on a bed in the corner were messed up and hanging off the edge of the mattress. Tools, scraps, and nuts and bolts littered the floor. The carpet was dark, but not in color. It was _burnt_ - patches of it were charred and coarse - and as Piper walked further into the room, the burnt needle-thin spikes prickled her feet.

She could only hear her pounding heart, only feel her throat go dry as her eyes darted around the room which she was sure she wasn't supposed to be in. Wading through scraps of metal before making her way over to his dresser – which was drowning with bottles of pills, pills, pills and more pills – she just stared at them – _stared_ – because that was all she could do.

She looked up into the dresser mirror to see her own reflection, shrouded in artificial light from the lamp in the corner. She did not see herself - she saw someone else, someone who had confused tears in the corners of her eyes, and lips pink and full from kissing so much. She saw someone who couldn't find answers. She saw someone who was _afraid._

She slowly backed away from the mirror, swallowing a lump that had formed in her throat. It dawned at her that Percy had been right. Leo _was_ dangerous. _This_ was dangerous. She stumbled into his nightstand, and bottles of pills fell to the floor, startling her as they rolled under the bed and across the burnt carpet.

_She had to leave._

* * *

Piper walked into the living room.

Leo was still sprawled out on the couch, his eyes fixed to the glowing screen of the television. When he saw her, he sat up, but she watched him from where she was with wary eyes.

"I have to go," she said immediately, her voice was stern and small. She watched as his eyebrows furrowed together in confusion.

"Why?" he asked.

"I just remembered that I was supposed to be at a friend's house half an hour ago," she said, and he gave her a look that told her that he was still skeptical, and that her lie wasn't as good as she thought it was.

"...Okay," he said slowly after a while, and he stood up from the sofa.

Part of her wanted him to sit down again, but that didn't happen. She tried not to tense when he strode over to her and snaked his arms around her waist.

He smiled down at her, and she gave him a half-hearted smile in return, half fear, half concern, all fake.

Leo leaned down and kissed her on the forehead, the dull tone of the television murmuring in the background.

"Bye, Pipes," he said, rustling her hair.

Piper gave him a goodbye kiss, slow and soft. She said her next words like she would never be able to say them again.

"Bye, Leo. Love you."

* * *

The very next day, she searched him up online.

There were a lot of criminal records – several of which Percy hadn't shown her before. Four charges for arson, one charge for attempted. Three weeks in a juvenile detention facility when he was fifteen. Two charges for breaking and entering a house in Texas. There was more information that she didn't bother to read, because she didn't need to. Watching the screen, her throat went dry. He was a lot worse than she had thought.

In total, he had spent 73 days in jail and had 10 criminal charges, and that was only from the three websites she had seen. She scrolled down some, overlooking records from a couple of colleges and some engineering schools until her eyes stopped at the word: _murder._

The corners of her mouth turned down in a frown, and she clicked the link. It was for an article written a couple of decades ago, and sure enough, it was about Leo.

_"Mother Murdered by Arsonist Son."_

She couldn't believe this. It had to be a lie.

Her eyes skimmed the page, and she took in the words that made the most impact.

_"Workshop…fire…dead."_

The only people present that day were Leo and his mother, and since she was the victim in the case, Leo was counted as the offender. He was put into foster care immediately after. Her eyes searched the document again for more, but she found herself with nothing but a feeling of dread at the bottom of her stomach.

_Leo had killed his own mother._

* * *

Two days later, she was back at his house, standing on the welcome mat and waiting for him to open the door.

The air was cooler than usual, not quite typical of mid-August. She heard barking in the distance, and laughter followed suit. Piper gripped the printed article in hand, chewing her lip. She wanted going to ask him about his parents, nothing more. She didn't want him to know that she was au fait with his past.

She was slightly startled to see the door open to reveal a fastidious man that she did not first recognize as her own boyfriend.

His eyes looked wild. His hair was a mess. Leo had bags under his eyes, and she would've found the sight of him appealing if he didn't look like he had just crawled out of a cesspool.

She asked the first thing on her mind, the words she had rehearsed in the mirror lost in the wind. "Are you okay?"

"I, um," Leo scratch his stubble, his eyes averting her gaze and darting to look at anything but her. "I'm fine. It's really nice to see you and all, but now's not a good time, so - "

He tried to shut the door. She put her foot in the way, and he looked up with a startled gaze that met her mindset one.

"I want to come in," she said in a stern voice that fed the tension in the atmosphere. This was uncharted territory. This felt dangerous.

Their gazes met, and the air became electric.

"I'm busy," Leo said in a voice equally rigid. "Come back later, okay? Maybe we can hang out then."

Piper glared at him, but not to the full extent; it was a glare in vain. After a stare off that would certainly go down into the books, she moved her foot, and Leo quickly shut the door.

She huffed. She didn't know what _his_ problem was, but with all those pills upstairs, she figured he had more than he could handle. She walked down his driveway, grumbling the entire time when she smelled it - something was burning. Her eyebrows furrowed, and she turned around.

A wispy column of blackened smoke rose into the sky and dissipated into the atmosphere, coming right from Leo's backyard.

* * *

"Happy Birthday, Percy!"

Hazel hugged the birthday boy, and then Frank crushed him in a bear hug. Piper couldn't help but smile as Percy tried to escape, but to no avail.

Sure enough, it was Perseus Jackson's birthday (cue confetti). The shindig took place at Mrs. Jackson's (or Sally, as she preferred to be called) house this year. She threw Percy's big birthday extravaganza almost every year, and, of course, Piper had been invited.

The Jackson-Blofis apartment was a tidy, well-kept place. Most of the guests were in the living room, where there was a sofa and ample fold-up chairs to sit on. Most of the party-goers were watching some football game on TV. Others held conversations in various spots of the room, saying standard small talk things, like "How's the fam?" and "It's good to see you again!"

The chatter didn't do much to stifle the awkwardness, but she guessed that it was plausible.

Piper sat in the corner alone with no one but her thoughts. She observed the gala from her recreated bar corner, and found most of her attention directed at Percy Jackson and his birthday hugs.

Speaking of the man of the hour, his face was turning red. "Okay, Frank, _geez_ - don't crush me to death!"

Zhang let go of him, looking a little embarrassed as Percy regained his breath.

"Whoops. Sorry," he said with a sheepish grin.

Some guests laughed, and Piper smiled before occupying her mind with other things. Almost everyone was emerged in conversation when Annabeth barged into the room with a blue birthday cake in hand.

"Who wants cake?" she asked.

"Me!" Percy said, umping up and down, while waving his hands in the air (he was such a kid). Everyone stood and started heading for the table in the corner of the room, which was already set up.

Percy sat at the head, Annabeth to his right, and everyone else took a seat after them. Piper found herself in a chair between Jason and Thalia Grace. She smiled along with everyone else as Annabeth lit the candles on the cake.

"Happy birthday to you..."

"ACHOO."

"Happy birthday to _you..."_

"ACH - "

"Jesus, Percy - act your age. You're 30, for Christ's sake!"

"Happy birthday dear _Peeercy..."_

He whispered the next part under his breath, but Piper heard it. _"Achoo."_

_"Happy birthday to you!"_

She gave in and laughed. There was small applause around the table as Percy leaned over the candles and rubbed his hands together as he thought of a suitable wish. He blew them out. More applause.

Afterwards, Annabeth started distributing slices of cake. Percy's was huge, nearly one-fourth of the entire cake. Piper didn't want much, so her slice was considerably smaller. Everyone stuffed their faces with Sally's homemade cake, and a conversation soon came to life.

"So, Percy," Jason began to ask as the birthday boy in question stuffed his face with cake. "What are you and Annabeth planning for the wedding?"

He and Annabeth shared a glance, and the two of them were all smiles.

"Well, we're planning to have it at the beach."

_"Oooh"s_ and _"Aaah"s_ circulated around the table.

Piper glanced at Jason out of the corner of her eye as the conversation took flight. Mr. Grace had just earned a position as board member on the committee of some big company in downtown San Francisco. He and Reyna had just started a relationship-type thing some months ago, and the two of them were supposedly going steady. Piper wasn't exactly sure what the two of them did back in Cali, but she knew that they liked doing it, because they always had smiles on their faces nowadays.

"What place did you have in mind?" asked Frank just as she picked back up on the conversation.

Piper wasn't exactly sure what Frank was doing lately. Hazel had told her some time ago that he had been looking into the veterinarian business, but had developed an interest in listing for the army. She wouldn't let him go, of course, but she was still worried. Hazel kept the opinion that war was too much of a precarious thing for someone like Frank.

Watching the bulky, warrior-type man across the table with skeptical eyes, Piper wasn't so sure if she agreed.

Annabeth turned to answer Frank's question.

"We're having it at Montauk," she replied, and she and Percy shared such a loving gaze, that it made Piper's heart melt to putty. "We plan to rent it for the weekend of the wedding."

She smiled. She remembered that Annabeth had told her that Percy's parents had met at Montauk - the sentimental value made it a good wedding spot.

There was more talk about the wedding, the catering, and the reception that she didn't quite catch. She ate some cake and stared at her plate as she moved its contents around, allowing her thoughts to venture elsewhere. Of course, she thought about Leo - how he was doing, if he was okay, and other things like that. She couldn't help but be worried, even on a day like this.

She and her mind were occupied with worry, so when someone asked her a question, she wasn't paying attention.

"How about you, Piper?"

Her head snapped up at the sound of her name, and her fork fell out of her hands and clattered down onto her porcelain plate.

"What?" she asked.

Every eye was on her. Feeling self-conscious, she searched for who had asked the question.

"I asked if you were available next week," said Annabeth, and her eyes flew to her.

There was a gleam of late-summer sunlight in her calculating gray eyes. The blonde gave her a fictitious smile that masked bad intentions, and Piper could tell right away that there was something in her tone, something in the atmosphere that was more than a little bit off.

Annabeth gave her a dissecting look that told her that she was trying to figure her out. "We have to go pick the flowers, remember?"

"Oh," Piper muttered before picking up her fork from a blob of icing on her plate. She nervously swept a strand of lose hair behind her ear, which was a long-time habit of hers. "Yeah, of course."

She kept going. "I was also wondering if you'd be able to help with moving some furniture. We'll need all the hands we can get."

She nearly forgot that Annabeth and Percy were moving in with each other next month. Piper glanced at her, and gave her a hasty and forced smile to let her know that she was done with the conversation. "Sure thing."

Annabeth wasn't done.

She folded her hands on the table surface, leaning back into her chair. The gleam in her eye grew bigger, brighter, until the day they had picked her up from the airport, the time Piper hadn't told her about Leo came back to mind. "When I say we need all hands, I mean _all_ _hands._ Maybe your boyfriend can come."

_Shit._

She dropped her fork again, and the clattering noise it made filled the surprised silence that Annabeth's comment left behind. Piper's startled look was met with a number of raised eyebrows, dropped jaws, and incredulous gazes that made her want to shrink down to atomic size and blend in with the other particles.

The tension was so thick, you could cut it with a knife. A thousand thoughts ran through her mind at once, and Jason was the first to speak.

"Since when did you have a _boyfriend?"_

More gazes. More silence. She opened and closed her mouth in an effort to answer, but no words came out. The temperature indoors felt like a searing one hundred degrees. She didn't know what to say.

Her nervous eyes met with disbelieving ones. "I - "

_" - Well,_ I think that's enough conversation for the day," said Percy hastily with a nervous laugh. Her gaze shifted over to him. Their eyes met, and she sent him a distress signal that she was sure he understood. His birthday hat was a little too far to the right, but that didn't hinder the look he sent across the table.

He gave her a stretched smile. "Piper, could you help me in the kitchen for a minute?"

Her gaze swept across the table and landed on a smug looking Annabeth.

"Yeah..." she trailed off, knowing that the other guests still had questions on their tongues. She stood quickly, and her chair scraped across the surface of the polished wood floor.

After one very awkward moment of walking past sets of astonished eyes, she arrived in the kitchen. Percy walked in after her, and as soon as she turned around, he already had his arms crossed and a look of ire on his face. His jaw was set, and his sea green eyes turned a darker hue of ocean.

"What the hell was _that?"_ he asked, his brows furrowed.

"She interrogated me," the words spilled out of her mouth before she could think to say them.

Annabeth had trapped her in a social environmental box, but Percy had gotten her out.

"When we picked her up from the airport, she knew that something was wrong, so, she asked me what it was. I told her about Leo, but not about the whole _'arsonist'_ thing - "

"You _know_ that you shouldn't have said anything," said Percy, "You said it yourself - _she's_ the relationship police, not _me._ What did you do to get her so _mad?"_

"She wanted me to tell her _everything,"_ she conceded in a tone equal to his, her voice strained and flustered, "I couldn't tell her. I _couldn't. _She wouldn't understand - "

_"You_ don't understand!" he snapped, and her eyebrows shot up as her jaw clamped shut. "He's _dangerous,_ Piper. He's a fucking _criminal,_ for God's sake. People like him don't _need_ to be understood."

At hearing this, her fists balled in anger and defiance. A feeling of dissent built up in her chest, and her nostrils flared.

"It's _not_ like that!" she cried, loud enough so he could hear, but quiet enough so the others couldn't. "I didn't tell Annabeth because she would've done the same thing - lecture me about how fucking _'dangerous'_ he is. Don't you think I _know_ that Percy? As the only person in the building who has actually _met_ him, don't you think _I'd_ understand? I _know_ that he's dangerous, I _know_ that he has a shitload of problems, so can you just stop for one fucking second and _shut the fuck up?_" She was panting now, and hard.

The severity of Percy's gaze began to diminish as her words found their way to his thoughts. He looked away in defeat and turned around, his party hat listing dangerously to one side. She glared at his back, and outside, the honk of a car horn blared outside of the kitchen window. More sounds were added to the scape - it was not only the white noise of the guests and the dripping of water from the kitchen faucet, but the whistle of a gentle summer tide breeze, and the _tick-tock, tick-tock_ of an antique clock on the wall.

"If you know that he's bad," he said quietly for her to hear, and she balled her fists tighter in preparation for another quarrel. "Then why are you still with him?"

Her entire life, she didn't have answers, but this time, she did.

"Because I love him," Piper said, glaring at his back. "Happy birthday, _asshole."_

She unballed her fists.

She was done here.

Piper stormed past an angry Percy Jackson and entered the living room once again, where she was met with curious looks and stifled silence. She walked to her chair, grabbed her purse, and walked across the room with their gazes on her back. She made it to the front door and grabbed the handle, but before she turned it, she whirled around.

Her eyes passed each party-goer before they rested on Mrs. Jackson.

"Thanks for the cake," she said, her voice a bit weak.

She opened the door and stepped out into the hall, where she was met with streams of summer sun that beamed through the hall window. Closing the door behind her, she headed down the stairs towards home.

* * *

_"Pipes, you have to stay with me, here."_

"Sorry, Dad," she muttered into her phone as she took a sharp left. Some guy in a teal Toyota Camry honked at her for nearly hitting his bumper. She rolled her eyes. They were New Yorkers. They'd get over it.

_"You know how much of a big deal this is to me,"_ he continued on the other line as she maneuvered down the crowded city streets. A large bird flew overhead, and its shadow was cast across the asphalt in front of her. _"A deal like this only comes once in a lifetime."_

"I _know,"_ she said in a teenage-daughter-voice that was well behind her years. "They want us to do a father-daughter movie. I get it. But I'm busy."

_"You think I'm not?"_ he replied.

She rolled her eyes again – she felt a lecture coming on.

_"I have six sitcoms to film in the next year, two dramas, one comedy, and let's not forget the two movies I was casted for - "_

"King of Sparta two and three, right?"

_"No, they're only making a two. The other movie is that one about the spies."_

"Breaking Bonds?"

_"Exactly. What I'm asking for is for you to take this one opportunity with me. It'll be a hit. Who better to play my daughter than my actual daughter?"_

"I don't know. Angelina Jolie?"

_"Piper."_

"Sorry."

_"Listen sweetheart,"_ he said with a temporarily defeated sigh. _"I have to go, but think about this, okay? We'll talk more on Thanksgiving, so you'll have time to."_

"Okay, Dad. I'll consider it."

_"Good. Love you, kay?"_

"Love you too, and you better show up. I want you to meet my boyfriend."

_"Oh, him. What was his name again?"_

"Leo."

_"Leo, of course. Tell 'Leo' I'm bringing assassins."_

She gave one final roll of her eyes before the conversation ended. "Goodbye, Dad." She hung up.

It was late October. Summer turned into fall, which threatened to turn into winter. The trees were barren and devoid of leaves, and a constant chilling breeze blew from the north. She had had to turn on the heater in her apartment, which sputtered to life after a season-long hibernation and began doing its job again.

She was still with Leo, who had apparently developed some odd bipolar behavior which she couldn't monitor. Some days he'd be fine, others not, and the remaining days he'd act like he did the days before Percy's birthday: he'd burn stuff. He never told her anything about being an arsonist or about his mom, and she didn't look into it. She left him alone to do what he wanted to do, and he didn't directly bother her one bit.

Piper spent most of her time at his house, talking and kissing and maybe a combination of both. Around her, he was normal and grounded. He didn't do anything that alarmed her at all. She still caught glimpses at cuts and bruises from time to time, but she forced them out of her mind. He was fine. _They_ were fine.

She didn't talk to Percy.

He never called or visited. The only time they'd talk was when she went over, and since Percy and Annabeth were now busy with wedding preparations (the wedding was set for June next year, and they had to start booking things from now), they didn't have much time to talk at all.

He'd always tell her the same thing: _"You need to stop, now, before one of you gets hurt." _

Piper would tell him to fuck off every time and to mind his own love life, but her conscience would often dispute with her on her own motives. _Whatever happened to that arsonist you read about online? What about him?_

She'd tell her conscience to fuck off, too. He was _Leo,_ not an _arsonist._ She grounded her faith in the belief that there was a difference, and that it was all in his past.

When nothing happened that aroused dismay, she entirely dismissed Leo's record from her mind. She was so enveloped in the belief that the guy she loved was normal, sane, and not at all a sadistic, inferno-crazed maniac, that today came as a total shock to her.

* * *

Piper was still driving, nearing his place when she saw a flash of lights in her rear-view mirror. Then, a common sound pierced the air, coming closer.

Sirens.

A bright red fire truck was charging its way down her lane. The shrill sound filled her ears, and she pulled over like she was supposed to, waiting for the truck to pass by her Porsche.

It passed. She pulled back into the lane and watched the fire truck blitz down the road. She eased onto the gas as the truck ran through a light and took a left, and her heart skipped her beat.

_Left._

_Left is where Leo lived._

She hit the gas.

Her hands gripped the wheel, her knuckles paled. She muttered swears to herself as she followed the path the fire truck had taken, pursuing the sound of sirens. She looked up, and in between the barren tree branches she saw _smoke_ - wispy, thick smoke that filled the air and threatened to block out the last rays of setting sun. She felt the prevalent human dread one feels when something bad happens, when a personal affiliated emergency comes up that deals with you and your emotions rather than some mumbled name on the news. Then and there, she truly felt what it was like to be afraid.

She saw flashing lights between the smog, and saw red licks of flame lash out into the sky. The scene was surreal as she approached a column of inferno that stood in the place where his house should've been, and she let out a strangled sob.

She sloppily parked a few blocks down the street, and stumbled out of her car.

People were standing outside on their parched lawns, holding belongings and each other. She stumbled past them, their cries and their terrified expressions, and bolted towards the giant bonfire that pulsed the air with heat before her.

The entire area was roped off, up to five houses down on each end. The problem with fires in the city was that everything was condensed; all homes were squeezed together in an effort to build more, fit more people. His house was wedged in between two others, and the fire fought to consume them both, while the firefighters sprayed it down and fought with equal zeal.

Her nostrils were flooded with the smell of burning dreams as she waded her way through the gathering crowd, and tears streamed down her face. _He was dead._ He _had_ to be dead. There were two ambulances parked across the street with their lights still flashing, and the paramedics were already on the scene. The entire predicament had the word _dead_ all over it.

She jumped over the first barrier, and someone yelled. She kept running, making a beeline for one of the police cars parked a few feet away from Leo's lawn.

She heard more shouts and footsteps behind her as she ran, but she didn't stop. She inhaled the toxic air and made her way over to the nearest police, whose eyes widened as soon as she turned and saw her.

"Miss, I _command_ you to get back behind that line. You're not supposed to - "

_"Where is he?"_ she hissed as the heat intensified, and the flames glowed a blazing shade of white.

The police officer's eyebrows furrowed under her gas mask. "Who?"

Something that was already fragile inside of her broke, and her next words were said in sobs that she couldn't control for the life of her.

_"Leo Valdez,"_ she said, her body shaking with every word, "He's _short,_ has _curly hair,_ he's _crazy, _and he fixes stuff and makes me smile a lot. He lived in that _thing_ that used to be a house over there, and I want him back. He's my boyfriend, _I love him._ Please, _please_ tell me what happened to him. _I just want him back."_

Piper broke down completely, choking on smoke and overwhelming emotion as she sank down to her knees. She hated crying. She hated acting like this. She felt vulnerable and stupid and angry and afraid, because this is not what she wanted at all.

She kept sobbing. She felt a hand on her shoulder, and looked up to see the officer, who hadn't left her side, but was standing there the entire time.

The older woman looked down at her with a look of pure pity.

"I talked to another officer," she said, "Leo Valdez was taken into custody almost an hour ago, and he's being held at the Lincoln Correctional Facility, at the northeast end of Central Park."

The fire roared in the background, but she heard the officer loud and clear. Hastily wiping away her tears, she shakily stood to her feet. "Thank you," she croaked, truly grateful. She glanced at the remains of his house, which were smoldering and festering under the intense heat of the sea of flames. _He wasn't dead._ Jail was much, _much_ better than _dead._

She ran back past the barriers, and no one said a thing. Running past the crowd, she made it back to her car, and revved up the engine to head off to a new location.

* * *

The hallways were stark white, blinding to the eyes.

The click of the heels of her shoes resonated across the tile floors, and the footsteps of the guards who flanked her sides echoed throughout the corridor. She made sure that her pace matched theirs, as she was just as determined as they were.

They turned a sharp left. She followed. They walked down the hall, slower now, until they halted at one of the tall, white doors with a barred, one-way glass window. The bigger guard pulled out a pass card and a set of keys, and she stepped aside. She heard the beeping of the buttons he pressed on the panel to the right of the door, and it swung open. They stepped aside for her.

She walked in.

His back was to her. He was sitting on the floor on a pile of blankets, and he didn't turn around.

His voice was hard and steely, full of hurt and tinged with madness. "What do you want?"

She gazed at his back, the shaft of moonlight coming from the small cell window shining down on him. "I'm not a guard, Leo."

The next thing she knew, she was in his arms.

He kissed her. She opened her mouth to say something, but he cut her off with another kiss, and a sorrowful look on his face. His eyes were brimming with tears as he squeezed her tight once again.

_"I am so, so, so, so, sorry,"_ he whispered into her hair and her ear as she hugged him back. _"I meant to tell you sooner,"_ he continued on as she squeezed him tight with the intent of never letting him go. _"I didn't mean for things to happen this way, I swear. I'm so sorry, Piper. I'm sorry."_

She meant to say something nice like _"I forgive you,"_ or something, but all she could do was give a sob of relief.

The guards awkwardly stood by the doorway as the two of them sank to their knees.

The shorter one coughed. "Um, sorry to intrude, but, Mr. Valdez, you're free to go. Your bail was paid off."

She wasn't sure if he had heard or not, because he just kept whispering apologies in her hair. He cried and kissed every inch of her face, and she was overcome with a wave of emotion that she hadn't fully been prepared for.

The guards were very uncomfortable now. "We'll just, um...we'll just leave now."

They stayed there like that for a long time. He cried, feeling terrible for what he had done, but he was _alive._ He was _here,_ in her arms, and she had no words to say, so all she could do was smile into the plain, orange fabric of his jumpsuit and try to think of a better moment than this.

Leo continued to whisper sweet nothings into the darkness of the cell, and she only hugged him tighter.

He was _okay._

_They_ were okay.

And for that, she cried, too.

* * *

...


End file.
